6 ms·

FreeBSD Experimenting with a Port of Nvidia's Linux Open DRM Kernel Driver

125 points by mikece 3y ago

loeg 3y ago
Direct to the source, if that kind of thing interests you more than Phoronix: https://github.com/amshafer/nvidia-driver https://github.com/amshafer/nvidia-driver
jxy 3y ago
Would it allow CUDA support?
- codetrotter 3y ago
  My question exactly :>
  - LouisvilleGeek 3y ago
    Long time FreeBSD'r myself going back to 2.2 and this has been the sticking point of the last couple of years for my org. Everything seems to depend on CUDA these days!
    - jmspring 3y ago
      Yeah, I just built a system that I would love to have used FreeBSD on, but the driver (and CUDA) situation. It's a rough spot to be in.
- ccrush 3y ago
  I've returned to FreeBSD after many years, and I just built 14.0 to get CUDA working. CUDA doesn't need this to run AFAIK. This is about the kernel providing a module that allows a direct rendering interface. CUDA doesn't render to the screen. IIRC, DRI/drm are kernel drivers for graphics that map the GPU video memory window into your process so you don't have to copy data or send it though a pipe or some such nonsense. it was a video optimization from the early days of Linux graphics when copying https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-register-os-un-lock-user-pages/174678/13 https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-registe... https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-register-os-un-lock-user-pages/174678/13 https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-registe...
userbinator 3y ago
I always do a double-take when reading "Open DRM". I wonder if those choosing the acronym did so on purpose.
- ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
  It's a dumb name, to be sure, especially in an open-source context where everyone knows what "DRM" is and will have an overwhelmingly negative reaction to it.
  - resoluteteeth 3y ago
    Anyone who uses linux/freebsd will know what DRM actually means in this context
    - selfhoster11 3y ago
      Doesn't make it any less annoying, from my own perception anyway. I have known about DRM standing for Direct Rendering Manager for years, but it's really annoying even today.
    - Qwertious 3y ago
      Sure, but it'll take a little longer to recognize the context, because the acronym is overloaded. It's like IPC. Or how "inflammable" means both "not flammable" and "extremely flammable".
  - hooch 3y ago
    Except DRM in this context is a Direct Rendering Manager [1] which is a slightly different struggle getting pixels onto the screen. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Rendering_Manager https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Rendering_Manager
    - ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
      Let's take a survey and ask people what "DRM" stands for. I would bet a decent amount of money that the copyguarding one wins out over the rendering-manager one.
gumballindie 3y ago
Now what? FreeBSD and Nvidia? Dont threaten me with a good time. FreeBSD is so clean that i would love to build a sleek custom variant even if just for my own use, but i need graphics drivers. A “proper” nvidia driver would be amazing.
- paulmd 3y ago
  NVIDIA does have "official" freebsd drivers (including display drivers/etc) but it's obviously not as easy as with AMD. I've never tried using NVIDIA (or graphics at all) on freebsd tbh and I don't know whether the experience works well or not. I do know there is no nvenc though oddly. because that's built around linux APIs too lol. but yeah freebsd is pleasantly uneventful and well-documented, and the handbook tells you like 90% of the sysadmin job too. and it's well-integrated with zfs and time-tested. it's a shame that docker is built around linux, that's where all the inertia is these days.
  - ccakes 3y ago
    > it's a shame that docker is built around linux There is some interesting work happening to get an OCI-compatible runtime working https://github.com/samuelkarp/runj https://github.com/samuelkarp/runj
    - paulmd 3y ago
      theoretically this is a job for branded zones too, BSD actually solved this problem better a long time ago! just write a shim that hooks whatever linux layer to the kernel layer. smartOS and proxmox both fill that niche for "hyperv, but it's application containers" niche perfectly. Or full VMs if you want too! https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19455-01/817-1592/gepea/index.html https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19455-01/817-1592/gepea/index.ht... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SmartOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SmartOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxmox_Virtual_Environment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxmox_Virtual_Environment but for both the "making docker work with BSD" and "making BSD work with docker" approaches, the question is how much time a company will spend on an alternative, upstart tech for something as foundational as their container deployments, without a really compelling reason. the answer is likely "zero" and justifiably so. it doesn't matter that you can run a linux vm, it won't matter that zones work with docker or that docker can use OCI. nobody wants to discover a whole new set of bugs and footguns with a niche technology stack. netflix really ran with it, but even they did not put application servers/containers on BSD, they just used it as a NAS store. which is fine, and that's something that can be encapsulated without letting BSD escape into the rest of your ecosystem. but even though the linux ecosystem is in a state of constant meltdown and rebirth, it's at least the enemy you know. I wonder if that will change now that redhat has slammed the door on non-commercial users. like where do you even go after that? ubuntu is clownshoes (and the snapd stuff has offended a lot of users). Debian I guess, or OpenSUSE. But SUSE is quite niche as well. Debian is probably the "sufficiently boring" answer, but freebsd could be a good alternative too if places gave it a chance. as I said it's very impressive how boring freebsd is. Most likely the thing you are trying to do will be either building/loading some module in /etc/rc.conf, or editing some config file in /etc/, or copying some template from /usr/local. And you just do it, there's no surprises, and you move on.
inparen 3y ago
My only wish is to access RTX card from by FreeBSD or Ubuntu VirtualBox VM for ML/DL stuff on my windows 11 laptop.
- modeless 3y ago
  That's supported in WSL, why not use that?
  - inparen 3y ago
    Thank you.
sharts 3y ago
It would be cool if gpu passthrough worked.
villgax 3y ago
Make LLMs write an eGPU driver for RTX cards over ThunderBolt!

125 points by mikece 3y ago

loeg 3y ago

Direct to the source, if that kind of thing interests you more than Phoronix: https://github.com/amshafer/nvidia-driver https://github.com/amshafer/nvidia-driver

jxy 3y ago

Would it allow CUDA support?

codetrotter 3y ago
My question exactly :>
- LouisvilleGeek 3y ago
  Long time FreeBSD'r myself going back to 2.2 and this has been the sticking point of the last couple of years for my org. Everything seems to depend on CUDA these days!
  - jmspring 3y ago
    Yeah, I just built a system that I would love to have used FreeBSD on, but the driver (and CUDA) situation. It's a rough spot to be in.
ccrush 3y ago
I've returned to FreeBSD after many years, and I just built 14.0 to get CUDA working. CUDA doesn't need this to run AFAIK. This is about the kernel providing a module that allows a direct rendering interface. CUDA doesn't render to the screen. IIRC, DRI/drm are kernel drivers for graphics that map the GPU video memory window into your process so you don't have to copy data or send it though a pipe or some such nonsense. it was a video optimization from the early days of Linux graphics when copying https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-register-os-un-lock-user-pages/174678/13 https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-registe... https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-register-os-un-lock-user-pages/174678/13 https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/cuda-and-nv-un-registe...

userbinator 3y ago

I always do a double-take when reading "Open DRM". I wonder if those choosing the acronym did so on purpose.

ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
It's a dumb name, to be sure, especially in an open-source context where everyone knows what "DRM" is and will have an overwhelmingly negative reaction to it.
- resoluteteeth 3y ago
  Anyone who uses linux/freebsd will know what DRM actually means in this context
  - selfhoster11 3y ago
    Doesn't make it any less annoying, from my own perception anyway. I have known about DRM standing for Direct Rendering Manager for years, but it's really annoying even today.
  - Qwertious 3y ago
    Sure, but it'll take a little longer to recognize the context, because the acronym is overloaded. It's like IPC. Or how "inflammable" means both "not flammable" and "extremely flammable".
- hooch 3y ago
  Except DRM in this context is a Direct Rendering Manager [1] which is a slightly different struggle getting pixels onto the screen. 1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Rendering_Manager https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Rendering_Manager
  - ShadowBanThis01 3y ago
    Let's take a survey and ask people what "DRM" stands for. I would bet a decent amount of money that the copyguarding one wins out over the rendering-manager one.

gumballindie 3y ago

Now what? FreeBSD and Nvidia? Dont threaten me with a good time. FreeBSD is so clean that i would love to build a sleek custom variant even if just for my own use, but i need graphics drivers. A “proper” nvidia driver would be amazing.

paulmd 3y ago
NVIDIA does have "official" freebsd drivers (including display drivers/etc) but it's obviously not as easy as with AMD. I've never tried using NVIDIA (or graphics at all) on freebsd tbh and I don't know whether the experience works well or not. I do know there is no nvenc though oddly. because that's built around linux APIs too lol. but yeah freebsd is pleasantly uneventful and well-documented, and the handbook tells you like 90% of the sysadmin job too. and it's well-integrated with zfs and time-tested. it's a shame that docker is built around linux, that's where all the inertia is these days.
- ccakes 3y ago
  > it's a shame that docker is built around linux There is some interesting work happening to get an OCI-compatible runtime working https://github.com/samuelkarp/runj https://github.com/samuelkarp/runj
  - paulmd 3y ago
    theoretically this is a job for branded zones too, BSD actually solved this problem better a long time ago! just write a shim that hooks whatever linux layer to the kernel layer. smartOS and proxmox both fill that niche for "hyperv, but it's application containers" niche perfectly. Or full VMs if you want too! https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19455-01/817-1592/gepea/index.html https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E19455-01/817-1592/gepea/index.ht... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SmartOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SmartOS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxmox_Virtual_Environment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxmox_Virtual_Environment but for both the "making docker work with BSD" and "making BSD work with docker" approaches, the question is how much time a company will spend on an alternative, upstart tech for something as foundational as their container deployments, without a really compelling reason. the answer is likely "zero" and justifiably so. it doesn't matter that you can run a linux vm, it won't matter that zones work with docker or that docker can use OCI. nobody wants to discover a whole new set of bugs and footguns with a niche technology stack. netflix really ran with it, but even they did not put application servers/containers on BSD, they just used it as a NAS store. which is fine, and that's something that can be encapsulated without letting BSD escape into the rest of your ecosystem. but even though the linux ecosystem is in a state of constant meltdown and rebirth, it's at least the enemy you know. I wonder if that will change now that redhat has slammed the door on non-commercial users. like where do you even go after that? ubuntu is clownshoes (and the snapd stuff has offended a lot of users). Debian I guess, or OpenSUSE. But SUSE is quite niche as well. Debian is probably the "sufficiently boring" answer, but freebsd could be a good alternative too if places gave it a chance. as I said it's very impressive how boring freebsd is. Most likely the thing you are trying to do will be either building/loading some module in /etc/rc.conf, or editing some config file in /etc/, or copying some template from /usr/local. And you just do it, there's no surprises, and you move on.

inparen 3y ago

My only wish is to access RTX card from by FreeBSD or Ubuntu VirtualBox VM for ML/DL stuff on my windows 11 laptop.

modeless 3y ago
That's supported in WSL, why not use that?
- inparen 3y ago
  Thank you.

sharts 3y ago

It would be cool if gpu passthrough worked.

villgax 3y ago

Make LLMs write an eGPU driver for RTX cards over ThunderBolt!